Measuring the right things

I was trying to think up an analogy the other day for the church. I was wondering what sort of metaphor could capture how much we miss the point in our faith. If the essence of the gospel is trusting in Christ and his love while being transformed in to his likeness how did we get to the place we are now. If the church is a body held together in sincere love, empowered by the Spirit working through every member why are things the way they are?

If the church were a business we would measure our profit and if we weren’t making enough we would change. If we were a hospital we would measure how many of the sick and injured become healthier. If we were a vocational training institute we would measure how many people get jobs and keep them in their area of training.

Now imagine a school that measured how much people enjoyed the classes, how great the day care was, how inspiring the teacher was, the levels of enrolment and the amount of funding they had but only passively cared about the success of their graduates in the workplace. That my friends describes most of the church in North America today.

We need to change what we measure and how we measure our success.

· Do people have a proper understanding of the gospel?

· Do they love the people that can offer them nothing in return?

· Are people willing to sacrifice for others?

· Are people becoming more like Christ in their values and behaviour?

· Do they have life and freedom?

If we considered these things, we would realize the state we are in and we would change. As long as we measure things based on our own personal satisfaction or by the markers of organizational success we will miss the point.

This entry was posted on April 20, 2008, 11:39 am and is filed under , , . You can follow any responses to this entry through RSS 2.0.
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Hey LT — excellant post. So–how’s it going at your end of the church-stick? Do you know any churches that are figuring these non-rocket-science things out?
Incredibly sad that things have gotten to where they are…